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Frankfurt am Main – The German Heart Foundation and the Björn Steiger Foundation want to increase the lay resuscitation rate in Germany and jointly increase their political reach. The foundations announced this today.
“As a conservative estimate, around 65,000 people die of sudden cardiac death in Germany every year,” said Thomas Voigtländer, Chairman of the Board of the German Heart Foundation and Medical Director of the Agaplesion-Bethanien Hospital in Frankfurt am Main, drawing attention to the problem.
According to expert estimates, around 10,000 victims could be saved if immediate resuscitation were carried out. However, the lay resuscitation rate in Germany is currently only 51 percent, according to Voigtländer.
“We urgently need to make Germany fit for resuscitation,” stressed the heart specialist. Other European countries, such as Norway and Sweden, have significantly higher lay resuscitation rates of more than 80 percent. “We need to get there too,” he said.
The main problem in Germany is a lack of information. Many people do not want to have anything to do with lay resuscitation and death. However, it is important to communicate that resuscitation is a necessity.
In addition, the information must also reach the population directly. According to Voigtländer, simply announcing and informing people is not enough. People must be reached directly and trained so that they can perform resuscitation in an emergency.
“It is completely unacceptable that we have such a low resuscitation rate in Germany,” stressed the chairman of the German Heart Foundation. So far, no campaigns have been designed to increase the rates.
The cooperation “Heart Safe – Saving Lives Together” aims to bring together the skills and strengths of the two organizations and to bring lay resuscitation to the general public. National and statewide as well as regional and local activities are to be developed together and training and educational measures are to be prepared. A special focus will be placed on resuscitation in schools.
“As early as 2014, the education ministries issued a declaration of intent to make resuscitation a compulsory part of school curriculum,” said Voigtländer. “However, this has only happened sporadically up until 2024.” The foundations are working to ensure that resuscitation training is made compulsory in school lessons. If people are introduced to the subject at a young age, this can lower the inhibition threshold in an emergency, stressed the heart specialist.
“With our collaboration, we will pool our expertise and resources in the future and use them even more efficiently,” explained Pierre-Enric Steiger, President of the Björn Steiger Foundation. “This will also enable us to raise even more people’s awareness of heart health and first aid.”
Increase influence in the political sphere
The President of the Björn Steiger Foundation believes that the current 4,000 training courses offered each year are not enough. Ministries, schools, larger companies and associations also need to be motivated to join the project..
The aim is to offer around 75,000 training courses per year. According to Steiger, this would work from an organizational point of view, but the offer would also have to be accepted. He hopes that the cooperation will increase pressure and awareness among those responsible and also increase influence in the political sphere.
“If the two largest organizations in this area join forces, we will have a completely different weight in political communication,” says Steiger. So far, the organizations have not been universally successful. But together they can ensure better perception.
“Together we want to ensure that at least 80 percent of all people who experience a witnessed cardiac arrest receive high-quality lay resuscitation,” the initiators of the cooperation concluded. © nfs/aerzteblatt.de
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